2 Samuel 24:23

24:23 I, the servant of my lord ¹  the king, give it all to the king!” Araunah also told the king, “May the Lord your God show you favor!”

Psalms 20:3

20:3 May he take notice ²  of your offerings;

may he accept ³  your burnt sacrifice! (Selah)

Ezekiel 20:40-41

20:40 For there on my holy mountain, the high mountain of Israel, declares the sovereign Lord, all the house of Israel will serve me, all of them ⁴  in the land. I will accept them there, and there I will seek your contributions and your choice gifts, with all your holy things. 20:41 When I bring you out from the nations and gather you from the lands where you are scattered, I will accept you along with your soothing aroma. I will display my holiness among you in the sight of the nations.

Ezekiel 43:27

43:27 When the prescribed period is over, ⁵  on the eighth day and thereafter the priests will offer up on the altar your burnt offerings and your peace offerings; ⁶  I will accept you, declares the sovereign Lord.”

Malachi 1:8-10

1:8 For when you offer blind animals as a sacrifice, is that not wrong? And when you offer the lame and sick, ⁷  is that not wrong as well? Indeed, try offering them ⁸  to your governor! Will he be pleased with you ⁹  or show you favor?” asks the Lord who rules over all. 1:9 But now plead for God’s favor ¹⁰  that he might be gracious to us. ¹¹  “With this kind of offering in your hands, how can he be pleased with you?” asks the Lord who rules over all.

1:10 “I wish that one of you would close the temple doors, ¹²  so that you no longer would light useless fires on my altar. I am not pleased with you,” says the Lord who rules over all, “and I will no longer accept an offering from you.

¹ tc The Hebrew text is difficult here. The translation reads עֶבֶד אֲדֹנָי (’eved ’adoni, “the servant of my lord”) rather than the MT’s אֲרַוְנָה (’Aravnah). In normal court etiquette a subject would not use his own name in this way, but would more likely refer to himself in the third person. The MT probably first sustained loss of עֶבֶד (’eved, “servant”), leading to confusion of the word for “my lord” with the name of the Jebusite referred to here.

² tn Or “remember.” For other examples of the verb זָכַר (zakhar) carrying the nuance “take notice of,” see Pss 8:4 and 9:12.

³ tc Heb “consider as fat.” The verbal form should probably be emended to יְדַשְּׁנֶהָ (yÿdashÿneha), the final he (ה) being understood as a third feminine singular pronominal suffix referring back to the feminine noun “burnt sacrifice.”

³ tn Heb “all of it.”

⁴ tn Heb “and they will complete the days.”

⁵ sn The people also could partake of the food of the peace offering (Lev 3).

⁵ sn Offerings of animals that were lame or sick were strictly forbidden by the Mosaic law (see Deut 15:21).

⁶ tn Heb “it” (so NAB, NASB). Contemporary English more naturally uses a plural pronoun to agree with “the lame and sick” in the previous question (cf. NIV, NCV).

⁷ tc The LXX and Vulgate read “with it” (which in Hebrew would be הֲיִרְצֵהוּ, hayirtsehu, a reading followed by NAB) rather than “with you” of the MT (הֲיִרְצְךָ, hayirtsÿkha). The MT (followed here by most English versions) is to be preferred because of the parallel with the following phrase פָנֶיךָ (fanekha, “receive you,” which the present translation renders as “show you favor”).

⁶ tn Heb “seek the face of God.”

⁷ tn After the imperative, the prefixed verbal form with vav conjunction indicates purpose (cf. NASB, NRSV).

⁷ sn The rhetorical language suggests that as long as the priesthood and people remain disobedient, the temple doors may as well be closed because God is not “at home” to receive them or their worship there.